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HELPDESK USER GROUP - Survey shows time needlessly wasted

According to a survey undertaken by the Knowledge Group, 46% of service desk managers think that answering user queries is their most time consuming task, and that 66% of their users seek help on subjects they have already received training on. Other findings indicate that the rapid pace of technological change, combined with the pressure to upgrade existing networks, means that 34% of service desk managers spend most of their time implementing new systems. Commenting on the findings, Alan Jones, software products manager at the Knowledge Group said: "All of us in the service centre business need to place more emphasis on making it easier to handle queries so that throughput is increased and users gain a better understanding of the problems being solved. Knowledge based solutions will help, but they are only part of a wider set of processes that need to be built into the service centre." Jones suggested that systems need to accumulate known error logs so that a profile of common questions can be built up. The idea is that as these FAQ's are ranked, they can then be posted onto the intranet, so relieving the call centre from problems users could resolve for themselves. The Knowledge Group has been working on projects, under the code name "Watcher", that seeks to solve this dilemma. The idea is that a core, rules-based engine is built that interprets the user's needs so as to recommend the most appropriate action. Links to LANDesk, UniCenter-TNG and HP OpenView are all part of a strategy that Knowledge Group hopes will enable the call centre to offer 24-hour operations without becoming overloaded with FAQ's.